"It's the hardest part of having ADHD, because so many people don't understand it..."

"It's almost like when a dog decides it's done walking and is immovable. When my nervous system is not on board, I am immovable."

"Object permanence issues do not just apply to objects.

We can literally forget people exist if they aren't directly in front of us or interacting with us. Maintaining social relationships and connections is extremely challenging.

It's miserable and probably one of the hardest parts of having ADHD, especially because so many people don't understand it."

"'Now' always gets priority over 'not now,' and 'now' has endless distractions to keep me from worrying about 'not now.'"

"For years, I self-medicated with Coca-Cola. I would drink 2 to 3 liters a day, using the combination of caffeine and sugar to help me cope. I don't like Coke and never really have, but it did the job better than anything else.

I'm pretty sure it's a major factor in my weight issues and recent diabetes diagnosis."

"One big distraction is better than a million little ones because I can switch back to the main task when I realize I drifted a second or two into the big distraction, rather than going off on one of a million other things that occurred to me."

"The chaos in your brain comes back when life is ordinary again."

"I was an overperformer in class, but couldn’t be bothered to do homework. I had great grades and was accepted into engineering school, but struggled in college because I  needed self-structure. 

I was diagnosed and medicated in my late 20s, and it changed my life. I can work office jobs now without pulling my hair out."

"I'm aware something is off, but I'm on the pill and my periods can be every few months, or I'll get two heavy ones in the span of a couple of weeks (this month it happened).

So I have no idea what's hormonal and what's just 'me.' Off the pill, I bleed way more, and it's been like that since my late 20s."

"Once I get derailed or distracted, it's impossible to get back to the original task, or if I do get back to it, it'll get done half-assed at the last minute. Meds have helped with the problem, but it's still there.

I have a high-performance engine with a faulty drivetrain connection. If we get it going, don't ask me to pull over to take a selfie in front of a rock. The car isn't going again after we stop."

"There are things I do every single day, but if I don’t actively think about it, I can forget to do it and not notice until much later, like picking up my lunch bag, headphones, or even my handbag. I can forget to take my medication or not grab my phone, and only realize when I try to turn my headphones on, and they don’t connect to anything. 

Multiple times, I've had to get off the bus and go home because I forgot something essential."

"Now consider how often a person with ADHD gets criticized for being disruptive, spaced out, annoying, disorganized, etc., compared to other people. 

It's a huge part of the reason why people with untreated ADHD have alarmingly high rates of depression and anxiety."

"I learned this when I played poker for the first time. I couldn’t use a poker face, which was funny because I lost every hand from excitement. But also, I never looked at my opponent’s face to see if they were behaving differently because I was so hyper-focused on what I needed to make the hand work that they just bluffed me every time."

"I sometimes describe it like this: Imagine you had to sit in a silent, empty room and you weren't allowed to get up from your chair or make any noise, you just have to sit there. Let's say you were forced to do that for 12 hours straight. Think about the slow descent into madness you'd experience without something to occupy you that entire time. Now take that 12-hour-long mental process and condense it down to 30 to 60 minutes.

"I was always horrible at school, and for the life of me, couldn't understand what I could have done to do better.

Inversely, I have been quickly given more responsibilities and promotions at many jobs, or randomly became the star student of a certain class or two, and again, for the life of me, could not understand what I was doing that helped me succeed.

That lack of a proper 'reward' system in the brain really sucks. In my life, I’ve only pursued things that, on paper, have caused me the least amount of trouble, as opposed to simply having an instinct or intuition for making daily decisions."

"Most times, the tasks aren’t related, but to find the order, I have to relate them in some way."

"I'll do a week's worth of work in a day and look like a star at work, meanwhile, I lost my phone, a shoe, never drank water, forgot I needed to go to the bathroom, raided my snacks 10 times, and forgot to text my friends because I remembered a work email while I was halfway through a text.

I was diagnosed as an adult, and I had so many systems in place that the meds were as upsetting as they were great. The quiet was thunderous, but the focus was too much and worked against all the systems I spent years perfecting. Could I finish that multihour boring task I usually avoid? Yeah. Could I do the 20 small tasks I usually do between meetings to entertain myself? Not even close. 

My mind was so lonely without the noise, and I got less creative work done."

"I think of it this way: Most of the time, you are juggling multiple thoughts at the same time. If you're doing a task while the TV and the radio are blaring in the background, you can process all three things at the same time, but then, for no reason, someone turns off the TV and the radio, and your head is quiet. Allowing you to hyperfixate on the one thing you are doing."

"Then, when you explain it, someone will tell you, 'Oh, but I’m sure you have no problems playing video games.' The thing is, I do. Sometimes I want to play a game I enjoy, but I'll do everything other than launch the game. I want to play it, but I can’t even make myself launch it.

Trust me, if I could be more organized, finish tasks ASAP, and not procrastinate, I would. I hate this so much. 

There are times when some aspects of ADHD help me, but most of the time, it’s a burden on me and others."

"It's not 'I hyperfocused on this jigsaw and did it in a day', it's 'I'm now in pain from holding off going to the toilet because I was too involved in what I'm doing'.

It's not 'I don't have the motivation to tidy up,' it's 'I started to tidy up, but thinking about every single process I need to do to complete tidying up has overwhelmed me, and now I feel paralyzed and can't do anything at all'.

It's not 'I'm always late,' it's 'I am so scared about being late and people being upset with me that I am now constantly early by hours sometimes because the anxiety of being late is unbearable and painful'.

On the flipside, I'm great at pattern recognition, so I guess that's something..."

Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.